26

Blake yelped as she was dragged into an empty classroom, the door clicking shut behind them as she was pinned to the wall by what appeared to be a very irate Yang Xiao-Long. Her partner's eyes were red as she scowled, her fingers gripping into her shirt so she couldn't get away.

"Okay, Blake, I've had enough of waiting so spill it!" She growled out, face close enough that she could feel the hot breath washing over her.

"What do you mean?" Came the wrong answer as she was shoved further into the wall like Yang was trying to merge her with it.

"Don't play dumb with me, partner, You think we all haven't noticed your little looks or the way you've been acting around Ruby? If you can't tell her then you can sure as hell tell me."

They noticed? She thought dumbly before groaning internally because of course they did. People tended to notice when someone was staring at them and it was with a horrid sensation that she realized just how much she had been staring at her leader.

The fingers loosened but didn't let go, as Yang looked into her eyes and pleaded, "Blake, please, what's wrong. We are partners aren't we?"

She bit her lip, she didn't want to refuse Yang, but Carmine would be very upset if she told anyone. However if there was anyone who would understand the need for secrecy…

"Yang, can you keep a secret? From everyone, including Ruby."

"Sure."

The fast and east answer had her eyes narrowing and her ears flicking forward under her bow, "Yang I'm serious. This isn't something I should discuss with anyone. I need you to promise me."

Yang's eyes widened and she straightened a little, she looked at Blake for a moment, "Okay, yeah. I promise, Blake, it won't leave this room."

That was better and she had to take a deep breath and order her thoughts, there was no easy way to broach the subject, "Okay, so when I ran into Carmine last week she let something slip while talking to me. Remember?"

"How could I not?" She snorted, "Is that what's still bothering you?"

"In a way. You see…" She took a deep breath, "She told me that the person she fell in love with was the other me."

It took a moment for Yang to process the information and Blake watched in real time as the gears of her brain ground to a screeching halt. It would have been amusing in any other situation.

Yang's jaw dropped, "You?! And Ruby?!"

"No!" Blake rushed out, "Not quite. I made her tell me more, badgered her into submission because it was driving me up a wall. She ended up telling me a bunch of stories but the main point was that it was a one way thing."

"You rejected my sister?!"

"Focus!" She snapped her fingers in front her her partner's eyes, "Not me. I don't know everything about what happened but Carmine made it sound like I was taken when she developed her feelings."

"Really? Who?"

"Yang…"

"Right, right, focusing." She took a deep breath, finally letting her go and moving to lean on the nearby desk, half sitting on it as she folded her arms and a look of disbelief on her face, "Ruby fell for my partner. To be honest I just can't see it."

"It's not exactly easy for me to believe either. But trust me, it's true."

"So the reason you've been so cagey is because you're super aware of my sister now?" Blake nodded and Yang burst out laughing, "Oh man that's hilarious!"

The blonde doubled over laughing while Blake scowled at her, "Really, Yang?"

"I just…" She wiped a tear from her eyes, "I forget that you don't know Ruby that well, yet."

That made Blake pause for a moment in confusion, but made more sense as she thought about it. Thought the last handful of months together had felt like an eternity, it was still only a few months. She probably didn't know a lot about any of them, or them of her.

"Look, Ruby's a late bloomer." Yang explained, very much echoing what Carmine had said, "The only way she'd be romantically interested in someone at this point is if they came with a lifetime subscription of high caliber dust rounds and Mechashift Weekly. Maybe that'll change in a few years but I don't think you need to worry about it as much as you have."

"That doesn't really solve my problem, Yang."

"Okay, hear me out here." Yang pushed off of the desk and picked up a piece of chalk, starting to draw on the blackboard, "You're worried about influencing her but I don't think that's necessary. If things happen then they happen, what's important here is how you feel." She turned around from the board and pointed the chalk at her, "How do you feel about Ruby?"

It was a question she had been afraid to ask herself, and felt like a slap in the face when it was directed at her. But she swallowed that flinch and forced herself to think about it. Ruby was nice, hopeful, optimistic but also naive. Of course, Carmine showed that Ruby wouldn't necessarily stay that way. Carmine was… it was hard for her to describe the older woman. She was strong and confident, so sure of herself and what she was capable of. People said confidence was attractive and it was, for the most part, true. There was a dark sense of humor and a hidden edge to her that hinted at someone who wasn't unused to violence.

But despite all of that, Blake couldn't help but grimace at the idea of showing interest in someone for who they might become. It felt creepy to her. In the end she just didn't feel that way about Ruby and didn't think she would, and she expressed as much to Yang.

The blonde closed her eyes, there was a sad smile but no reproach, "Yeah, then there's not much you can do about it so what point is there in worrying?"

It was a very simplistic idea. Just don't worry about it. If it happens it happens. She wasn't used to thinking like that and it felt appropriate coming from her partner.

"You just want me to… stop worrying about it?"

"Well yeah. I mean you shouldn't worry about things you can change, because you can do something about them. And you shouldn't worry about things you can't change because they are out of your control."

"Yang, that is terrible logic."

"Eh, it's worked so far." Yang shrugged her shoulders and Blake had to resist slapping her forehead. Dealing with her partner was like that sometimes.

"Your idiotic philosophy aside-"

"Hey!"

"- I don't see much choice but to forget about it for now. Or try to."

"Well there's no better way to do that then a distraction!" Yang slapped her hand onto the blackboard, drawing a cartoonishly bad set of stick figures that Blake couldn't make head nor tail of, "Who do you think you were with if it wasn't my sister?!"

Blake groaned, "Who are those supposed to be?"

"Sun and Carmine. Got any other ideas?"

"No…" She reluctantly admitted, "Sun is nice and all but he's kind of… His kindness is smothering."

"The list of suspects is growing short, Blake."

"Well I don't know what you want from me. It's probably someone we haven't met yet."

"Or maybe it was Weiss!"

"What?" Blake stared at her partner dumbfounded.

"Think about it! Forbidden love between a princess and an assassin. It sounds like the plot of one of your smutty books."

"They aren't smut! And not Weiss. Not interested." She hesitated at Yang's intense stare, "Not… that there's anything wrong there. She's just not my type."

Yang nodded, satisfied, "Speaking of books, a torrid romance between teacher and student sounds like one of yours as well."

"And what's that supposed to mean?!" Blake blushed, it was irritating that she was correct.

Her partner gave her an impish smile, "Nothing much just that Carmine's single too~"

"Y- you can't be serious. Yang, did you hit your head?"

"Not a chance kit-cat." Yang pushed away from the board, "Carmine's my sister too, and I think she should be happy too."

She should be happy too? That didn't make much sense, Carmine seemed pretty happy. No, no she wasn't, she just put on a brave face. She'd seen it in her office when she got drunk and told her stories and also in the infirmary when they had first met. A heavy feeling settled into her stomach as she looked at her partner who had lost her joking smile. It was replaced with something unreadable.

"What does that have to do with me?"

"Well nine years isn't so huge a difference."

Blake felt her face heat up but this time it wasn't embarrassment, instead her eye narrowed and she stalked forwards, getting into her partner's face, hissing, "This isn't a joke, Yang! The person she loved wasn't me!"

Yang stood her ground, "Except that it was you. Or it could be if you wanted it to be. All I'm saying is give it some thought. After all, you seem pretty protective of her."

With a pat on her shoulder, Yang was gone, leaving Blake standing in the empty classroom alone. She reeled with the conflicted thoughts swimming through her head. She felt shell shocked and rooted to the ground.

Protective?

It was a strange thought but it sounded like the right word for what she felt. Carmine had shown her a vulnerability and she felt responsible for it. It was something she wasn't sure anyone else had seen. Maybe the others knew of it, but Blake was the only one that Carmine had shown.

Only her.

It felt strange to think it, but it reminded her of Adam. Not in a bad way, though, but rather of a time before he had lost himself to spite. Back in the times when they had been happy together, he had been in a leadership position, only letting her see him break down. She remembered his face as he wept over the deaths of an entire mining encampment, the faunus left to the Grimm as the upper management had fled. He had remained stoic to the members of their team, but in the privacy of their tent, that had fallen.

The bell rang and Blake started panicking, bolting out the door, heart racing as she realized she was late to class. She managed to slip in a minute later, but Professor Goodwitch stuck her with a glare. She would be getting a detention later.

It looked like Jaune was up against Cardin again, holding his own for once. Blake took the seat on the bench next to her partner, at the end, which put her right next to Pyrrha Nikos. JNPR were more friends of Ruby and the others than her but she still liked them. She just tended to not speak to the others. Pulling out a book and reading in Goodwitch's class was a quick way to get more detention so instead she leaned over to PYrrha.

"How is he doing?" She asked in a whisper.

The champion looked surprised for a moment, did she really think she wasn't at least interested in their team?

"Much better, I'm sure you can see." Jaune was actually winning for the most part but not by much, "He's been taking to training a lot harder lately."

"That's good." Blake idly watched, wincing as Jaune took a solid hit from Cardin's mace.

"Hey Blake." She looked over, raising her eyebrows at Pyrrha, "You guys know professor Rose, right?"

There was an interested look in her green eyes, even as she looked back to the fight.

"Well I suppose we know her a bit better than most other students seeing as how she's Yang and Ruby's sister."

She thought she caught a hint of suspicion on the redhead's face but it was gone in a blink, "Have you met any of her friends?"

Friends? That couldn't be possible. All of Carmine's friends were in a different time, and dead. Her eyes narrowed.

"Why do you ask? Has someone approached you?"

Pyrrh shook her head, "Not quite." She bit her lip, and then lowered her voice, "Jaune and I found the Professor collapsed last week, and when Jaune came back there was a man about the same age as her with the Doctor. He told me his name was Jack and a friend of the Professor."

Blake's eyes widened, that wasn't good. Someone claiming to be her friend was either lying or…

"Do you know anything else about him?"

"He's an Arc." She added, finger on her chin, "When I asked him if he was related to the Arc family he said he was. He looked a lot like Jaune, family resemblance it seems."

"Huh, no we hadn't met. But she's not exactly a friend so it's not like I know a lot about her."

Pyrrha hummed noncommittally, "Jaune says he doesn't know him, but also that his father isn't exactly close with his side, but it is strange to think that there are two Roses who have Arcs as best friends."

The match was called, victory by aura loss. Cardin stood and helped Jaune up, having just barely come out on top of the spar. An awfully sportsmanlike act for the bully. He may have stopped bullying Jaune, but he was still a racist in her eyes. The two o them walked off to the locker rooms to get changed as Goodwitch called another duo out to spar. Sun Wukong and Emerald Sustrai, not a spar she was interested in. Instead she turned back to Pyrrha.

She needed a distraction, it wouldn't do for Pyrrha to think too hard about the inconsistencies, "Have you asked Jaune to the dance yet?"

Her eyes bugged out, her hand flying to her mouth as she gave Blake a scandalized look, "W-what do you mean by that?"

"Oh, you weren't going to ask him?" It seemed like it had the effect she had wante dit to. Not difficult, Pyrrha's one weakness may well have been Jaune at this point, not that she could understand what the girl saw in him.

"I was going to." She trailed off, her face going red, "But how did you know?"

"I think Jaune is just about the only person in the school who doesn't."

"Oh no." The redhead buried her face into her hands, her ears quickly starting to match the shade of her hair, "Am I that obvious."

"Any more obvious and I would start to wonder what way he swings. Back on topic though, the dance is in a few days, why haven't you asked him yet?"

"I've tried!" Pyrrha whined and Blake marveled at the petulant tone coming from the normally composed girl, "But every time I try I just…. Can't."

She looked miserable, "Nothing's going to happen if you don't do anything."

"I know-"

Their conversation was interrupted by the arrival of their subject, fresh from the locker rooms. Weiss completely ignored his presence, steadfastly determined to pretend he didn't exist. Ruby cheered him on as he walked by.

"Good job, Jaune! You almost had Cardin!"

"I still lost, though." He objected with an embarrassed look while he scratched the back of his head.

"Don't sell yourself short, ladykiller." Yang added next to her sister, "Cardin you to cream you but you nearly had him that time. Give it a few more weeks and you can pull of a win."

"You think so?" He reminded Blake of a puppy with the way his eyes lit up.

"You got this Vomit Boy!" Ruby teased him with a cheeky grin on her face.

"Har har." Jaune rolled his eyes, "And how long until you beat Pyrrha, Craterface?"

As they descended into playful bickering, Ruby wailing on him with her tiny fists, Blake looked back at Pyrrha. The girl had gone still, eyes wide as she stared at the two of them.

"Relax, Pyrrha, they're just friends." She attempted to smooth things over, not wanting her to jump to any weird conclusions.

"What?" Pyrrha looked lost for a moment, "Oh, right. Yes, I am well aware of their friendship."

Her expression quickly developed into that polite, practiced smile of hers. She didn't have time to question it as Jaun arrived and sat down on the other side of his partner. With no further chance to talk she resigned herself to watching the fights, there would be a handful more, the one in the ring winding down as Sun clearly outclassed the green haired girl he was fighting. Oddly enough Ruby was cheering her on and she had to wonder if she knew the girl.

In the back of her mind, the conversation with Pyrrha was set on repeat, her suspicious mind going over it in detail, wondering what, exactly, it was the girl was thinking. Obviously the champion suspected something, but that that was, she couldn't tell. Time travel was so far fetched she didn't think it would be a reasonable conclusion but there were others she could jump to.

There's also someone else from the future, too. Jaune, from the description. Well it wasn't like it wasn't obvious from what Pyrrha had said. Why hadn't Carmine told them? Did she not trust them? Maybe she didn't think it was important? It annoyed her that maybe their entire team was an afterthought, treated like a nuisance.

However the curiosity wouldn't leave her, she couldn't help but wonder what Jaune a decade older was like. It was hard to imagine him as a man. She just felt like he was far too soft as he was. Carmine, however, was proof that anyone could change in unexpected ways and obviously Jaune had survived the longest out of them all in the future, a fact that had her grimacing. This older Jaune would probably be skilled, but what kind of person was he? Was he jaded like his best friend?

The questions that swam around in her mind occupied her until the bell rang, signalling the end of class. She got up, shouldering her bag as she made to leave with her team.

"Ahem, Miss Belladonna." Processor Goodwitch's visage was stern and uncompromising, "Please stay with me for a moment."

Dammit.

-SY-

Winter stood straight in front of the door to Ironwood's office. Well, office was a bit of a misnomer. The rest of the Atlesian forces had arrived with the students for the festival, as such Ironwood had summoned her to a private briefing room. It felt a bit large for two people, but needs must, she supposed. She knocked before promptly entering, stepping into the chamber with a salute.

The General turned around and returned her salute, "At ease, Specialist. Come in and make yourself comfortable."

Winter relaxed her posture a bit, moving in to stand at rest. Though General Ironwood made note of it, he didn't ask her to sit. She would have if she wanted to, since he had given his permission.

"Sir." She started, "Do you have a task for me?"

"Yes I do, Winter." Ironwood leaned on the desk that was at the head of the briefing room, "As you may know we are close to springing out trap. Ozpin has made me aware of a breach that is planned on the Vale CCT."

Her eyes widened, "Do you wish for me to head a guard detail?"

"No." He shook his head, "As you know Cinder Fall has stolen some of the Maiden's power. This puts her above most Huntsmen and Huntress level combatants. If we attempted to thwart her attempt it could result in catastrophic damage to the tower itself, which we must avoid at all costs."

Slowly she nodded along. Avoid damage to the tower was paramount since the entire worldwide network would go down if one of them did. A design flaw, but she wasn't an engineering or telecommunications expert so she could not say if it was unavoidable or not.

"Very well, what am I to do?"

"I have an important mission for you. The White Fang have taken up residence in the remains of Mountain Glenn and are excavating the old transit tunnel between it and Vale. Their plan, as Rose has explained it, is to excavate the tunnel and repair a train. The train will then be loaded with explosives and stolen Paladin units."

"So this is where they have taken them." She observed.

"Indeed. After that the train will depart, the explosives used to create holes in the tunnel to allow Grimm in to follow it. Once it reaches the sealed exit, it will crash. The intent is to break through the sealed tunnel, lure Grimm into the city, and use the Paladins to cause more chaos and extract themselves."

"That is…. Monstrous." Winter was aghast at the idea, it was horrific, even for the White Fang.

"That is where you will come in. You will be partnering up with Qrow Branwen on this operation and I want you to follow his lead. You two are to shut the operation down and arrest as many of them as you can. Including Torchwick."

"Yes, sir." She acknowledged. It would be unpleasant working with Branwen but not impossible as long as he remained on task. Although she found him irritating and unprofessional, she also respected his skill

"Good. Currently I have technicians working to create a closed system in the CCT to prevent any tampering Fall will attempt, so no need to worry about things here. You're to set out the night after the Beacon dance."

"I will be ready, sir."

"I expect you will, Specialist. Dismissed."

Winter saluted and marched out of the room, wanting to get any requisitions she needed in quickly, she only had a few days to secure supplies. She reminded herself to talk to Weiss, especially since her sister would be going to Menagerie.

She scowled to herself. To say she was unhappy with that fact would have been a severe understatement. She would be holding Rose personally responsible for her safety, though if anything were to happen then it wouldn't matter. The one person she cared for most would be gone.

If there was one thing she was grateful to the Professor for, it would be the push to induct her into the General's secret society. The way she had viewed the world had shifted so much since the revelations they had dropped on her. Salem and the Maiden's, that Ironwood intended for her to inherit the Winter Maiden powers. Even had a bit of a chuckle at the name, too, in private.

Her biggest worry was that she would be too distracted to accomplish her mission if she was worrying about her sister. Winter knew Weiss could take care of herself, and they would have a qualified huntress with them, too.

"Hey."

She came up short, face to face with Qrow Branwen, leaning on a doorway. As usual he smelled of booze and cheap cologne, he swayed to his feet with a wave.

"Branwen, to what do I owe the… pleasure."

"Now is that any way to talk to your partner, Ice Queen?" He gave her a smirk that made her want to wipe it off of his face.

"We are not partners, I will simply be accompanying you on your mission."

"Right, right." He nodded, running a hand across his stubbled chin, "But you are following my lead on this."

It wasn't a question, so all she did was nod to him. She wasn't sure why he was on the flagship but he must have had business with the General or was perhaps running an errand for the Headmaster of Beacon.

"That's good. I look forward to working with you." He stuck his hands into his pockets as he walked past her, heading towards the same room she had come from. That more or less confirmed her suspicions as to why he was there.

"Qrow."

He half turned to her, looking at her with one pale red eye, "Sup?"

"Carmine." She began, "Can she really protect Weiss?"

He didn't answer right away, choosing instead to face her fully. There was a long, considering pause as he watched her. She didn't know what he saw when he looked at her, but whatever it was had him turn serious.

"Of course she can." He paused, "But if that's not enough for you, she won't be alone."

"Who else is going with them?" She asked.

Qrow grinned broadly.